Face recognition: This new tech could transform identifying missing kids

Remembering faces is often easier than recalling names. This intuitive human ability of remembering faces is being deployed in various projects across India. Even though the dust hasn't settled around the use of biometric usage of fingerprints and retina scans, face recognition systems are yielding benefits that few could have foreseen. 

The best results have been demonstrated by the national TrackChild portal run by the Ministry of Women and Child Development. Early pilots by Track Child and Delhi police could match the faces of almost 3000 missing children with those registered in child care homes. The project builds hope that not just children but adults who are lost and missing could be traced and reunited with families using face recognition software. Police across the country have hundreds of thousands of photographs of missing people reported by their families. There is another set of photographs of people found and sent to care homes as they were unable to give their personal identification. Often these are kids or adults who have lost their memory because of trauma or age related ailments. The need now is to create a central database which can accommodate millions of faces that can be systematically matched. 

These may be early days for face recognition in India but it is likely to be a mainstream technology very soon. Various government departments across the country have begun exploring ways to use face recognition. 

Face recognition is set to do much more than find missing people. National identity system of Aadhaar is rolling out face recognition feature from August. This feature will be added to the existing identifiers of finger prints and retina scans. This feature will be especially useful for those whose finger prints have worn out because of age or physical labour. For the elderly retina scan is also inefficient and has created problems for Aadhaar. Face recognition will be tested and over the next few months this could be used for every user. 

Once Aadhaar creates a national database of faces matched with identities of citizens, many other services and facilities could ride on this. 

As it happens, we use our photograph for almost every single form or application. Our photos lie in several different departments and private organisations. From applying for a passport to a phone connection to college/university and finally for jobs, a photo is essential. A potential national database of faces could eliminate the use of printed photographs. A simple number would offer every information about the user to the accepting organisation. 

The earliest use of face recognition could be at airports. Airports Authority of India is installing automated walkthrough security scanners that deploy face recognition at Varanasi airport. The first such usage in India could set the tone for deployment across all airports in India. Soon paperless entry into airport terminals and boarding flights could be a reality. Many European countries already use such software at immigration for their own citizens. 

Several global and domestic companies are offering various versions of face recognition solutions for various services. 

There are rising concerns about privacy, biases and incorrect face recognition. As the usage grows, so should a regulatory environment around face recognition. This is especially important as a few dozen start-ups and large tech companies have identified face recognition as an important tool for business and social services. It might be important for these companies and government agencies to collaborate for establishing a framework that allows improved usage while protecting information and avoiding duplication of efforts. This is yet another technology that could be terrible if it goes rogue, but a boon when used responsibly.